Former FIFA vice-president banned for life from football-related activity

The Ethics Committee in a statement this morning said the former Caribbean federation president “was found to have committed many and various acts of misconduct continuously and repeatedly during his time as an official in different high-ranking and influential positions at FIFA and CONCACAF.

Former FIFA vice-president Jack Warner has been banned for life from all football-related activity, the adjudicatory chamber of the Ethics Committee of the sport’s world governing body said today.

the former Fifa president and executive committee member, has raised suspicion at the timing of his life ban from participating in any kind of football-related activity worldwide.

The ban, handed down by the adjudicatory chamber of Fifa’s ethics committee, came as football’s governing body finds itself embroiled in a serious of corruption scandals. Pressure has grown on the president Sepp Blatter and Michel Platini, one of the candidates to replace him, over a £1.35m payment for which Blatter is subject to a Swiss criminal investigation.

Warner’s ban was announced by the ethics committee in a statement saying, in his positions as a football official, he was a key player in schemes involving the offer, acceptance, and receipt of undisclosed and illegal payments, as well as other money-making schemes.”

Yet Warner was defiant, and responded: “I left the Fifa in April 2011 and if in September 2015 the Fifa wants to ban me for life without even a hearing then so be it. I do not believe, however, that this will serve as the distraction to the Fifa’s present problems as the Fifa wishes it to be.

“Given what is happening in Zurich with Blatter I wish to say that there is no such thing as coincidence.”

According to Fifa’s statement the ethics committee, chaired by Hans-Joachim Eckert, began its investigation into Warner’s activities in January following its report into the 2018 and 2022 World Cup bidding process.

Warner, who has maintained his innocence, is wanted in the US on corruption charges and earlier this month Trinidad and Tobago’s attorney general signed “authority to proceed” documents, seemingly clearing the way for extradition proceedings to commence.